Rural Reading: Fine feast for a birdwatcher

Some days are better than others and one day early this week was better than most.

Before I even got to the end of my road I knew I was in for a special day as I spied a buzzard and a red kite flying low over the houses, and a large flock of starlings sitting on the TV aerials.

As I headed towards the river the hawthorns by the edge of the meadow were alive with redwings gorging on the ripe berries.

Crossing the river over the first bridge I saw a pair of grey wagtails flitting about on the bankside.

There was a flock of siskins and goldfinches in the alder trees and shortly after a flock of longtailed tits appeared in the marshy thicket on my left.

A flicker on a tree trunk across the river turned out to be a treecreeper, so I hung around to watch it for a moment.

I was getting cold, and decided to walk more quickly across a meadow where I normally see nothing of interest – only to spook two green woodpeckers from under my feet. Had I been more cautious and observant I might have seen them first and been able to watch them.

As they flew over some trees, a small group of snipe flew towards me. I guessed somebody further on had spooked them too, to my advantage. I watched through binoculars as they circled around and to my amazement, as they flew over a hedgerow, some redwings I hadn’t seen took flight too, and I had the pleasure of watching a mixed flock.

The next half an hour was relatively uneventful and I headed home, happy to have seen quite a few interesting birds. Just as I crossed the river I saw a water rail vanish into the undergrowth. I stopped on the bridge to look for it and to my astonishment a cettis warbler burst into song ten feet away.

An extraordinary bit of bird watching, a mile from the heart of Reading.